Issues over Vande Bharat sleepers to be made by Russian firm SPV have been resolved, says railways | India News – Times of India

NEW DELHI: Amid the ongoing standoff over the change in the design of Vande Bharat Sleeper Trains to be manufactured by a joint venture (JV) led by a Russian railway majora top railway official said all issues have been “resolved”.
However, he claimed that the Russian company has limited production capacity because the trains there have fewer coaches, while the company said last week that it is able to supply trains according to the railways’ requirements and was waiting for the finalization of the design changes where the national government asked for. transporter.
Indian Railways has awarded production of 1,920 Vande Bharat sleeper coaches Kinet railway solutionsa joint venture of Russia’s TMH and railway PSU, RVNL.
Responding to a question about the status of the project, the railway official said design was never an issue at the Russian company. “The company has no experience with the production of a train set of more than six or eight carriages. We had clearly told them that we would give them the design of Vande Bharat and they could use that design for production. I would like to clarify that when the contract was signed, it clearly stated that they had to produce trainsets with 16/20/24 coaches to meet our domestic requirements.”
However, TMH CEO Kirill Lipa had told a group of Indian journalists in Moscow: “For us, change in the number of coaches does not make any difference. During my last trip to India we discussed obstacles with the decision makers. They explained to me that they had fixed the base number of coaches in a configuration of four each. For a train the numbers can be 16, 20 or 24. For us, the connectivity of these trains and coaches is no problem at all. So whatever quantity they ask for, we will produce.”
Lipa had also said that the significant design changes included an additional toilet and more luggage space in each coach and a pantry car in each train. He had claimed that with a current track record of manufacturing 1,200 sleeper coaches per year, the company can achieve the targets of the Indian Railways. Lipa had claimed that sanctions will not have any impact on the project.